He said the firstsounded like a torpedo or other naval weapon detonating. The second, he said, was much larger and “consistent with further warheads being triggered.”

Russian officials have insisted at least some sailors survived and later pounded out distress messages on the hull of the submarine.

But there have been no signs of life since Tuesday, and the navy has given conflicting estimates of how much oxygen might be left on the Kursk.

Some say the air generators were probably wrecked in the accident; others insist there’s enough backup oxygen to keep the sailors alive for two or three weeks.

In a bleak assessment, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov described the sailors’ plight as “close to catastrophic.”

Meanwhile, Moscow and vacationing President Vladimir Putin came under more fire for waiting four days to accept offers of help from other countries.

A British mini-submarine was on its way to the accident site in the Barents Sea but won’t arrive until tomorrow, and a Norwegian rescue team won’t get there until Sunday.

The Russian rescue capsules have proved to be no match for raging storms in the accident area. Racing currents and swirling sands at the bottom of the sea have stymied every attempt to latch the bell-shaped chambers onto the sub’s escape hatches.

Relatives of the trapped submariners were following the rescue efforts in the Arctic port of Murmansk – their ordeal compounded by the lack of reliable information.

“What can I know, apart from that my husband is dying there,” a weeping Galina Belayeva said.